The disposal of textile fiber waste generated by textile machines has, for some time, been successfully accomplished by apparatus and method using traveling pneumatic cleaners. Such traveling pneumatic cleaners typically have blowing air outlets for directing flowing streams of air toward textile machines and suction air inlets for taking in air and fiber waste.
With many traveling pneumatic cleaners known to persons skilled in the textile and cleaning arts, fiber waste gathered by the cleaner is collected in a chamber. Such fiber waste collection chambers typically are formed as a portion of a traveling pneumatic cleaner and move with the cleaner along a predetermined path adjacent or extending over the textile machines.
It has been proposed heretofore that fiber waste collected in the chamber or chambers of a traveling pneumatic cleaner might be unloaded from the collection chamber periodically and automatically in response to movement of the cleaner. Such unloading arrangements typically provide doors on the collection chambers movable from normally closed position to opened position and an unloading station adjacent the path of travel of the traveling pneumatic cleaner and connected to an appropriate remote source of suction. In such unloading arrangements, the traveling cleaner and unloading station cooperate for unloading or withdrawing fiber waste from the collection chamber or chambers at periodic intervals so as to maintain high efficiency for the traveling pneumatic cleaner.
In fiber waste disposal systems installed in textile rooms containing a plurality of textile machines, economies can be realized by providing a central source of suction for the unloading stations, so as to draw fiber waste withdrawn from the traveling pneumatic cleaners to a single central location. Where a system includes a plurality of unloading stations, it is typically deemed appropriate to reduce the suction flow provided by the central station from the sum of the flows which would be required were each unloading station individually serviced. That is, if a room contains five unloading stations, it may be appropriate for a fiber waste disposal system to have a central suction source sized to accommodate three unloading stations. An assumption underlying such sizing is that no more than three of the unloading stations would be operative at any given time.
While experience with such fiber waste disposal systems has been successful, the energy required by a central suction source sized in accordance with the assumptions mentioned above is relatively great. Further, the assumption is not always correct, and an occasional activation of the design number (or more) of the unloading stations results in failure of the central collection system. That is, using the example above, in the event that four of the five unloading stations should be actuated simultaneously, none will efficiently unload the corresponding traveling cleaner or withdraw the fiber waste therefrom.
As will be appreciated, reduction in the sizing of components used in an unloading system will open the possibility of reduction in component cost. Further, where a traveling cleaner is unloaded each time that it passes adjacent an unloading station, significant wear and tear on components of the system occurs. Additionally, such frequent stopping for unloading reduces the number of cleaning passes of the textile machines, by occupying a portion of operating time with the unloading process.